Boat Hangar Nieuwpoort

A boat hangar is more than just a storage place for boats or for the distribution of life jackets.
This project also deals with the position of humans on the water, on the land and in the wind. It is therefore also a landscape project as it mediates between nature and the human scale. It offers a roof and shelter but also relates to the water, the air and the ground on which it stands.

The onset of the design process was subsequently dual, combining the complex programmatic functionality to the specificity of the context.
The client requested a substantially large building with minimum height, linked to a complex internal program because of the presence of many different users. We searched for the most straight-forward design: a building as compact as possible with a footprint of 35 by 80m with a distinct architectural presence, next to the water and the access roads. In order to clearly divide all user flows, the many large spaces (a hangar, multiple workshop rooms, a refectory, a drying place, changing rooms and sanitary facilities) were organised by one simple division within the rectangular footprint, establishing a boat hangar on one side and a “front building” on the other.